You mean the clowns who used the app you tell them to use because none of you even know where things are anymore, to be told there's 562 in the store, but there's none on the shelf, but if we pester enough managers eventually, someone will get the lift and bring the box down that's been right there the whole time? Those clowns? Cus Home Depot customer service has been shit since they stopped hiring actual trade professionals who know what they're doing. You HAVE to be an annoying asshole or you'll never get anything there anymore. I've literally had associates tell me "we're out of stock" and I point up and go "what about those boxes right there??" followed by "oh, let me see if I can find someone allowed to use the ladder".

Home Depot gets the customers they deserve for the "service" they now provide.

I worked in a department store when I was a teenager. My favorite was when people came in looking for a video game console days after it released and ask you to look in the back because maybe one fell between some skids or something. Like Buddy, if we had one to sell we'd have sold it. Those things go right into a cage once their received. Ain't no one losing track of them, they literally print money for the store. A lot of people just assume retail workers are all incompetent.

Adding in edit: although sometimes it ended up with the customer screaming at us, it was always great to ask them if they really thought they were the first person today to come up with that idea. For a moment before they yell again they look dumbfounded. Worth it!

I used to do that too! "Do you have this?" "Oh, the most popular item three days before Christmas which I've been asked about thirty times a day for the last month and a half? No sorry, it's out of stock until at least after the holidays." "Well can you go look in the back?"

Then I'd just go back there and dick around on my phone for five minutes, the manager would come out and ask what I was doing, I'd say pretending to look for something we don't have and she'd go "oh, okay" and go back to playing solitaire in her office lol.

Except for that one time I went to pick up a video game that was just released. It wasn't on the shelf, so I asked someone about it. She said she would check in the back. 5 minutes later she came out, game in hand.

Oh you mean when the website that you told me to check says it’s in stock, and I can see it on the top shelf with my own fucking eyes, and you insist it’s out of stock WHILE I’M POINTING AT IT asking for you to get the ladder. And I’m the clown. Home Depot and everybody who works there can suck a fat dick.

I used to work in an electronics place, and we had a guy who came in once who wanted a specific camera at a very specific price. As in, he came in and flat-out said "I want this and I will give you exactly this amount for it." The price he had in mind was about $10 below our cost, which we told him, and he absolutely refused to budge on it, and also wouldn't just leave. Me and the manager literally had to show him the thing on the cashier screen that showed our cost and stuff and the managers was like "If we sell you this, it's like we're paying you $10 to take this camera from us."

He eventually left without it, but it took forever.

Why do you need to ask if you’re sure? When I worked retail the quicker I got you what you wanted the quicker you would leave me alone so why wouldn’t I be sure? It’s not like I would pretend to check.

I don't see how people can't understand how retail economics work.

Look, I drove to the store to buy a thing. If you don't have the thing, that means I wasted my time. But since that situation means I am to blame for my own bad feelings, such is obviously impossible since I am a perfect and flawless being.

The only logical conclusions are that either you are incompetent, or that you hate me.

At that point is it ok to call the supplier to ask if there are any stores currently ordering the product?

People also wildly overestimate what a normal retail worker has influence over. One time we were out of a particular new model of camera because an airport in Malaysia got attacked and all the shipping got delayed, and someone asked me what I was going to do about it. Well I was actually heading out to Malaysia this weekend to sort it out personally lol.

THERE'S NO PRICE TAG ON THIS SO IT MUST BE FREE RIGHT HAR HAR HAR

I always ask "I presume you only have what's on display but in case I'm wrong, do you have any other stuff"? (Mostly when I'm buying new shoes or a shirt, that's pretty hard to find in my size). If they say they don't, they don't. Why would they lie to me, their purpose in the shop is to sell stuff.